Best headset and soundacard for music and gaming 2012

hi guys i have been looking for a headset for a while and im tossing up between getting a good sound card and a good heasdet all up $200 or a good headset for around $120 i have been looking at the steelseries 7h usb, the corsair vengeance 1500 and the steel series siberia Na'Vi edition. The music and games im into are MW3 Bf3 CSS and many FPS games, the music mainly metal and dubstep.



k thnx guys

a headset (with mic) or headphones (no mic) ?

7.1 or stereo?

the best i've heard so far has been the current set i own... a stereo set of studio headphones: audiotechnica ath-m50s. at 35ohm (i think) it can be driven unamped from a pc headphone port. if you want you can get a portable amp or the soundcard with a headphone jack amp to make it sound even better.

honestly i find stereo is fine for fps. you do not need to hear bullets behind you to know that they are. other audio cues (such as sound level) will give you a fake 3d location to go by.

stereo phones are better for music as music is not recorded in surround sound. i listen to dubstep (among lots of other things) and they are very balanced. good base but the highs and mids aren't muddled.

studio headphones like the ones i listed have larger drivers and (opinion here) sound better than the 7.1 headphone sets you can buy.

keep in mind that you do not need to buy the special soundcard which has an amped up hp port (the xonar) but some like it. i've used my headphones on a normal hp port and they sound fine do to their relatively low (for studio phones at least) resistance.

i've seen the price vary alot depending on where you buy. from $80 all the way up to $180. you should be able to get a deal somewhere.

as i stated before... my recommendations for headphones is the audiotechnica ath-m50s (or m50 for coiled cable). its what i use. if you do not like the brand then i've heard sennheiser makes some nice studio phones as well.

as far as a soundcard.. if your pc has decent onboard sound you could use that. if you want a dedicated soundcard then personally i prefer soundblaster software. if you can get a card (like the xonar) which has a port specifically for high end headsets it might be the best but any normal card should work with the phones i use.

bad soundscape for gaming?

i will admit that i havent used them very much for gaming, only during a month long trip out of state, but they sounded fine for the game i was playing. even unamped out of a laptop. i have however put them through quite a rigorous selection in music... with no falters. that covers pretty much every single genre out there which is a broader sound spectrum then any game.

to me they sound very balanced and i dont see why they would have a problem with any type of input.

remember though that everyone has their own opinion. what i like you may not like. what that website says is their own opinion and may differ from what you or i might think. whenever getting audio advice you always have to take it with a grain of salt.

most people recommend the 7.1 gaming headsets which i think are crap. but to each their own.

remember buy what you want. if you buy local you can always return them if you dont like them. that goes for any headphone you buy, even if it is some other model.